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"ReComposed" by Doug Varone and Dancers

Doug Varone and Dancers1/18/2017

Freeform Review:

On January 18th I attended one of Next Move Dance Performances at their new home, the Prince Theater. Since 1983 Next Move Dance has been instrumental in bringing various types of dance companies to audiences in Philadelphia. Doug Varone and Dancers presented three different dances. ReComposed had its premier in 2015

Doug Varone's impetus for making ReComposed is a painters work, that of Joan Mitchell. My initial feeling as the red curtain ascended and the first piece, ReComposed, began was that it was magical. This first piece begins to create an illusion of a force that moves the body like the work of a painter. The sheer body suits in the beginning of ReComposed allow their flesh tones to show through. The technicolored backdrop keeps changing, and this effect played with the dancers movement.

One movement in particular happened to escape me. It was half-way through ReComposed when Whitney Dufrene steps on stage looking different from the rest of the dancers. She is wearing a stripe of red on her black body. I could not believe my eyes. I was following the intensity of the physical lines which the dancers made by design. When Whitney Dufrene lies on the stage reaches up, she rotates around to face the audience, and holds her hands out in front of herself. It was as if she was holding the impetus in her hands.